Evening,
In the end I decided to cough up a bit more and went for the Benro KS-1 ball head off eBay.
Since this thread I researched various heads and struggled with making a decision between a three way or a ball head and which make/model to go for.
The opinions on Benro being a cheap Chinese copy of Gitzo left me in slight trepidation when waiting for the delivery. I was half expecting it to be of an inferior finish and quality to the 'eBay Indian Gimbals' that I once had.
I got the head this morning. Poor quality? Not a bit of it at all, it is well engineered and finished. I have had a play with it and I think this is a quality item and it ticks a lot of boxes for a travelling birder/photographer. I am highly impressed with it.
It locks solidly and holds a decent weight. Landscape and macro photography will be a breeze with this head. When using my longer 400mm f5.6 lens I simply drop the ball head to the side and use it like a Gimbal. It is not as fluid as the Jobu head but works on the same basis and lets me go out for the day with one head when doing general photography.
I shall now be obtaining some more plates to convert my whole set up to the Arca Swiss system and focussing on the Jobu Gimbal and this ball head for all my needs.
There is a sliding safety pin system on the plate holder of the ball head making the use of some other Arca Swiss plates impossible unless you remove it completely (the safety pin) but it is a minor hindrance to me at the moment.
Cheers,
Andrew.
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